For the last couple of weeks, my faith has been truly tested; the acronym above was a true testament that I had to not only place on Facebook to encourage others, but it was also what I needed to do; when I felt like I did not have anything else to do, which was to STAND IN FAITH!

Don’t get me wrong, it’s so easy to motivate, uplift and encourage others – It’s almost like second nature, something that I can easily do in my sleep and not miss a beat to the drum; but when I have to take a swallow of my own medicine and become my own self therapist…..I’m at a loss and don’t know what the next step should be, I literally become clueless…

Over the course of the weeks, I moved; had major car trouble; the IRS decided to freeze my account (will talk about soon); someone very dear to me almost died and was rushed to ICU and on top of all that – the house I just moved into has issues going on with it behind the scenes that I did not know about, so it’s very possible that I may be moving again within a year or sooner – Did I mention the IRS froze my account???….so I’m broke, need to get to work and my gas light is on; not to mention the car wouldn’t start…

Standing in Faith was the last thing on my mind – What I wanted to do was break down and cry, who do you turn too?…Yes, God is able but sometimes and if you’re willing to be real about it – You don’t want GOD when everything seems to be hitting the fan and it’s on its on its last spin and about to crash as well. Every post that’s put up on Facebook is coming from a real place of struggle, no gimmicks, no games, no pills to make you feel better and act like everything is okay; let’s all smell the flowers and keep moving……it takes everything I have to post, because there have been times when I didn’t want to, nobody’s listening or reading anyway; my mind says but my heart says PRESS ON, sometimes the greatest testaments in our life are from our own pain and experiences.

But I had to tell myself – how can you tell someone else what to do if you’re not doing it; Kind of like that old saying our parents used to tell us growing up “Do I say and Not as I Do” – But in the Kingdom of God, we are the first testers the experimenters of struggle and pain; we have to go through it because if we don’t we cannot be a help to someone else whom may be going through the same thing, so we must hold on, stay strong and pass the test.

I had to hold on, I talked with God and laid everything out before him; “All this belongs to you” I said & pushed through; not to say that I still didn’t think about it because I did, but I know my God is able – he’s not the type of man that kicks you when you’re down or tell you “I told you so” or offer a helping hand when your life is good only to draw it back when you really need him. When he says in his word that he will never leave you nor forsake you (Hebrews 13:5), he means just that; he’s always there for you no matter what Good or Bad, he’s got your back.

I went to lunch with a co-worker the other day whom happens to be a good friend; as we were sitting at the table we were talking about life and its ups and downs, stressors, family, kids and so forth; I began to tell her that I know what she was talking about with stressors, she looked at me and said well; what did you do when you found yourself in a bad place? I didn’t get a call about lunch or anything…(which is normally what we do when we want to get out of the office and vent, we eat lunch) I told her you know what?, I just talked to God – because a lot of times when we’re going through a tough time, the first thing we do is run to someone else to vent and let out all of our frustrations, we seek them for advice, comfort and solace and when we’ve gotten a little of that to give us a boost – Then we tend to go to GOD because we know that he’s the only one that can truly fix it.

I used to be the first person to run to anyone whom would listen or talk to a best friend about my issues but I’ve learned that while that’s okay, going to God first is the best solution. I don’t have to worry about being judged, I don’t have to worry about being scrutinized or looked at differently because I made poor choices, I don’t even have to worry about him discussing the matter with anyone else, it’s just me and him. So I said all of that to say no matter what LIFE may bring your way – some of us have more issues than others, no issue is greater or lesser in God’s eyes – He’s ready to listen and help you through what you feel like is the end of your world.

Stand in Faith, even if you’re being hit by your Hardest trial – I can tell you I did and everything that I mentioned up top as of today has all been worked out; the enemy desires for you to give up because he’s already told God that you would. But isn’t it a Wonderful thing to know that God didn’t tell the enemy he’s RIGHT, he told him he’s WRONG! Because greater is he that’s within you, than he that’s within the world.

When everything else is FALLING, STAND! & watch everything that FELL rise up again in FAITH…